Re: So ashamed and devastated

I truly feel your pain and can sympathize with what you're going through. I, like just about everyone on these forums, was a rebuilder so I can relate to your pain of not wanting to "make a mistake" or feel that you've "effed up" when you've worked so hard. My personal rule of thumb is to never, ever rely on anyone to pay or for payment of any of my credit card bills. Even if that person promises me that "they'll pay me tomorrow" or "before the bill comes" or whatever the promissory message is that I am being told by them. If I am not comfortable that I can cover the bill or payment myself without relaying on their reimbursement (in the off chance that they don't reimburse me), then I don't charge it. Anything unfortunate thing can happen to that person or any odd Murphy's Law type of scenario could happen and I wouldn't want to be left holding the stick...if you will. I'm sorry this happened to you and hopefully AmEx will realize that they're shutting down a good customer. I wish you the best of luck in getting this resolved.

Then the good news is the closing of those cards should have minimal, if any, impact on your score. Assuming they even report the accounts at all, they won't report as charged off, just "closed by credit grantor".

Yes, on a manual review someone might have questions about it, but if they did you would have the best. explanation. ever!

Best of luck getting them to reinstate the accounts, though! That really would be the most just and fair resolution to this situation. If you run out of people to contact and still haven't gotten them to budge, ask around for some additional contacts...this board has a wealth of knowledge about specific creditor contacts that people will PM to you if you need it!

Re: So ashamed and devastated

Wow this is outrageous.. you should NOT feel ashamed! You should be Insanely MAD at your CU! Im allllll for fraud prevetnion but that hold shouldnt have been placed until they contacted you!!! This should have never happened and i feel really bad for you.. I hope this matter gets cleared up and you retain your amex!!! BEST OF LUCK!!!

Re: So ashamed and devastated

Sorry, but something is not adding up here. Why didn't you and your boyfriend know there was a fraud freeze before the payment was considered late? How much time did you let elapse before you figured out there was a problem? You have some time between the time payment is due and time you are officially late, so what happened between the day you were billed and the day it was considered late enouth for Amex to FR you? It wasn't like this just happened in a 2 day period. There had to be weeks at minimum for you to figure out there was a problem. And if there was a problem, why didn't you take one of your other cards and pay off AMEX until it got squared away?

This is always a problem with authorized users in my opinion and why I would never trust my finances to a girlfriend or what not. Ultimately, you are the only person responsible for YOUR account. Yes we're supposed to trust the ones we love, but come on, this was totally avoidable. Learn from this going forward.

1. Never let another person be responsible for paying YOUR bills (even if they are somebody you love).

2. Always follow through to make sure the payment was posted in a timely manner. I can't count the number of times I hear people say, "I thought so and so made the payment, I was wrong." Regardless if it was a mistake, error or other. You should always be on top of it.

3. Let's say you get a bill and there's a 21 day period to make payment. If you entrust somebody to make payment by day 7 and it hasn't posted yet, then YOU pay it and deal with the person directly. Why would you ever just blindly trust and not actually check your acct to see if the funds cleared? Just sounds kind of ridiculous to me.

I'm sorry but this is partially your fault for making these mistakes. Learn from them and take him off as an AU on your other accounts. If there's not enough communication to know when stuff is supposed to go through and it's THAT HARD just to get a payment in, then maybe you don't deserve an AMEX. Just my opinion. Go ahead and flame away, but I think this whole situation was avoidable if you had just followed up on the payment before it was late.

I found this at this website. I don't have AMEX, but this person does:

"

There is a "please pay by" date on the statement that is like 15 days after the statement closes, but that is actually just a suggestion. Payment is not considered late unless it has not been received by the time the next statement closes."

So that means that a full statement period had to have passed for you to be late and you're telling me this whole time you didn't know what was going on and whoopsie, it just hit you like a big surprise? You never logged in to check your balance in that whole period? You never wondered, "Hmmm, why does it still show $3000 dollars due?" I'm not sure why everyone is patting you on the back for being irresponsible with your credit, but you're not going to get any sympathy here. Pay your bills on time if your boyfriend can't, bank error or not. And if you can't pay your bills when they are due, then you are better off not having a charge card and sticking to credit cards where you can make the minimum monthly payment. Amex made the right call in my opinion.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

Sorry, but something is not adding up here. Why didn't you and your boyfriend know there was a fraud freeze before the payment was considered late? How much time did you let elapse before you figured out there was a problem? You have some time between the due date and payment, so what happened between the day it became due and the day AMEX froze you? It wasn't like this just happened in a 2 day period.

This is always a problem with authorized users in my opinion and why I would never trust my finances to a girlfriend or what not. Ultimately, you are the only person responsible for YOUR account. Yes we're supposed to trust the ones we love, but come on, this was totally avoidable. Learn from this going forward.

1. Never let another person be responsible for paying YOUR bills (even if they are somebody you love).

2. Always follow through to make sure the payment was posted in a timely manner. I can't count the number of times I hear people say, "I thought so and so made the payment, I was wrong." Regardless if it was a mistake, error or other. You should always be on top of it.

I'm sorry but this is partially your fault for making these mistakes. Learn from them and take him off as an AU on your other accounts. If there's not enough communication to know when stuff is supposed to go through and it's THAT HARD just to get a payment in, then maybe you don't deserve an AMEX. Just my opinion. Go ahead and flame away, but this would never happen to a responsible person.

Happy Soda.. I’m not going to flame because this board isn’t made for that... everybody is entitled to their opinion... its why this board is here.. to give our thoughts and perspectives... but I would think a majority of this board would disagree with you. They did do the responsible thing.. they attempted to pay the bill that was due! Ignoring the payment would be wrong.. Let’s give them some tips on how to straighten this issue out with Amex.. Not say things like "maybe you don’t deserve an AMEX"... Courteous is contagious my friend!

Re: So ashamed and devastated

I understand your point of view Tommy, but you're telling me that from the time to where they got the statement to the time it was considered late, they didn't know what was going on? Yes, I have had banks freeze stuff on me, but never has it taken more than a week or so to get things cleared up. I'm sure this couple had more than a month to fix the problem and they instead chose to let their charge card become late. That's being irresponsible.

If my credit card is due on the 15th and I tell my wife to pay it by the 2nd of the month, you can bet your life I'm going to check to see if it's been paid. I'm not just going to sit around twiddling my thumbs because her bank is being weird. I'm going to pay my bill by the 15th. That's what responsible people do, they follow through with their payments, regardless of what their bank is doing. The minute the boyfriends bank froze the funds, they should have found another way to pay the bill. That's my opinion. I know that being irresponsible is given a pat on the back here at times, but I'm here to give people a reality check. You can't just put all your eggs in one basket like this and then cry when they all break.

Always have a backup plan or don't get yourself in these situations to begin with. If you yourself don't have $3000 dollars to cover a bill if your boyfriend can't, then you shouldn't be letting him charge on your card.

I also found this on this website:

"I believe that you have until 45 days after statement close before you pay any penalities or fees."

So she basically let 45 days elapse before she did anything. How is that being responsible? You're telling me it took 45 days for the credit union to clear a freeze? I find that highly unlikely and unbelievable. Here's what probably happened. They attempted to make payment at the last possible minute (maybe 10 days from late) and then they ran into this big problem. Irresponsible people are going to be irresponsible, no matter how much credit they build up. This is why banks have a hard time trusting people who make mistakes, because they will usually make them again.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

And if there was a problem, why didn't you take one of your other cards and pay off AMEX until it got squared away?

I hope you realize why this is a ridiculous question. In case you don't I will explain it to you.

1. If OP thought there would have been a problem they would have corrected it, most people pay their bill and then leave it not check it everyday until it clears all accounts.

2. You can't generally use a card to pay a card.

3. This assumes that OP had double the funds to cover the payment, while I hope everyone has double the funds to cover any payment issue that could arise it's silly to assume everyone does when we know some people don't.

People are telling the OP how to correct the issue because this is terrible customer service. This same thing could have happened if a processor incorrectly billed OP which I've seen my customers have to deal with and then correct.

Forums posts are not provided or commissioned by FICO. Forums posts have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by FICO. It is not FICO's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.

Advertiser Disclosure: The listings that appear on myFICO are from companies from which myFICO receives compensation, which may impact how and where products appear on myFICO (including, for example, the order in which they appear). myFICO does not review or include all companies or all available products.

† Credit cards for FICO Score ranges: The score ranges are guidelines based on internal myFICO analysis of actual applicant approvals, and having a FICO Score in a particular range does not guarantee you will be approved for credit cards recommended in that range. These ranges were not provided by any card issuer.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION: All FICO® Score products made available on myFICO.com include a FICO® Score 8, along with additional FICO® Score versions. Your lender or insurer may use a different FICO® Score than the versions you receive from myFICO, or another type of credit score altogether. Learn more

FICO, myFICO, Score Watch, The score lenders use, and The Score That Matters are trademarks or registered trademarks of Fair Isaac Corporation. Equifax Credit Report is a trademark of Equifax, Inc. and its affiliated companies. Many factors affect your FICO Score and the interest rates you may receive. Fair Isaac is not a credit repair
organization as defined under federal or state law, including the Credit Repair Organizations Act. Fair Isaac does not provide "credit repair" services or advice or
assistance regarding "rebuilding" or "improving" your credit record, credit history or credit rating. FTC's website on credit.